There are many things that can go wrong when travelling. When they do, the key is to keep calm, accept it and deal with it.
Trials and tribulations seemed to abound on this Irish trip.
It started on Day One. My debit card didn’t work at ANY ATM. This trial caused a little stress but I had brought some Euros from home so I wasn’t too worried. I’d advise, even if you have a cash card, make sure you have cash on arrival. The taxi driver who took me from the airport to my accommodation in Dublin didn’t accept card. This turned out to be normal.
My phone didn’t work until I accepted Australia’s Telstra deal for $10 a day for a phone and data allowance. I had to accept the deal to be able to call my Australian bank to sort out the ATM problem. Annoying but doable! Apparently Ireland’s ATM’s don’t accept Cheque account debit cards. I was impressed that my bank, the CBA, was able to figure it out and change the account name at their end to a Savings account.
Staying calm and thinking rationally led to Problem Solved! A good outcome: cash and phone communication. Both handy when travelling on your own. Calm and rational behaviour weren’t quite so much in evidence when faced with the next Tribulation.
On Day Six I dropped my phone in a Galway toilet. Despite snatching it immediately and feeling alarmed enough to want to give it mouth to mouth resuscitation, it only worked for the next twenty hours – just long enough to deceive me into thinking it would survive. In the time of my reprieve, I went about my business researching a few locations for my novel. I took lots of photos. When the phone died, without warning, I lost the photos. I didn’t have auto back up to the Cloud.
Trying to keep calm while feeling that losing my phone was worse than having no cash, or anything else I could think of, I made my way to my next destination and looked for a mobile phone repairer. This was in Donegal Town and the owner of the business was very helpful. Relief flooded over me until he declared that there was water in the mother-board and the phone was most likely, stuffed!
He then offered to sell me a new phone. I swiftly pulled out the credit card, paying for a 128GB iPhone, desperation fogging my brain so that I didn’t notice little things, like the phone didn’t come in a box! He kindly offered to help set it up and I practically kissed his feet. Oh no, he said, don’t you back up to iCloud? Huh, no, I back up to my computer which is at home. I was then given an abrupt lesson in how useful the Cloud is. Very little personal information could be put on my phone, which was upsetting, but worse, it gave the phone-dealer an opportunity to rip me off! The first phone he helped me with had a fault – the fingerprint set-up didn’t work. So I was given another phone…. Fast forward back to Australia where I try to Restore from Computer and I find that I hadn’t noticed something else – the phone had been swapped for a 32GB!
Lesson: Don’t rush to the toilet when you keep your phone in your back pocket. Or better still, don’t keep it in your back pocket. Also, don’t be in such a panic about the drowning of the phone that you don’t notice you’re getting conned! And…. USE THE CLOUD! Don’t be scared of it, seniors! It’s a sophisticated system of storing your data and means you can get this data back if you stuff up or lose your device.
The final trial happened towards the end of my trip. I drove the scenic way from Bushmills to Belfast in Northern Ireland, driving all day along narrow laneways and stopping at ruins and coastal villages. What a peaceful day I had! I arrived with enough time to look around Belfast for a few hours before dinner. Rummaging around my bag to find my accommodation details, I realised, with a rapid feeling of dread (constriction of throat and gut), that I had left my documents folder at the previous guesthouse. Sinking from hope and denial to acceptance, I phoned the host. Yes, the folder was there. Passport, hotel vouchers, licence included. Did I cry? Did I swear a stream of profanity and throw a tantrum? No! I just swore a little, sucked it up and headed up the highway. The return loop took me three hours. Lesson: Always check you have ALL your stuff! By dealing with it straight away and not dwelling on the inconvenience, I was then able to take myself out for a classy meal, sip my wine and enjoy my evening. Calm!
We can’t always control what life deals us, but we can control how we deal with what it does.
Carla Simmons Writer 